[mythtv-users] Uverse STB control?

Paul pturpin+mythtv at gmail.com
Mon Nov 23 19:30:36 UTC 2009


On Mon, Nov 23, 2009 at 12:24 PM, Marc Randolph <mrand at pobox.com> wrote:
> Howdy all,
>
> We're considering switching to U-verse.  Looking through the archives,
> there is surprisingly little discussion about interfacing to U-verse
> equipment - which either means it must work like a dream, or nobody
> has tried it!  I'm actually having a hard time believing both of
> those.
>
> Of the few discussions there are, I only found one with really
> discusses trouble figuring out the timing for the IR Blaster for
> U-Verse (hence the reason eric is referenced in this email).  Anyone
> have it working like a dream?
>
> Thanks,
>
>   Marc

I experimented with U-verse for a short period of time and had it
working with MythTV. I don't think "dream" would be the word i would
use to describe it. It took me a lot of work and experimentation to
get channel changes to work well. The ir receiver it has is very
picky, it would not even work well with my harmony remote. A few tips
if you decide to go that route.

1. When sending ir commands instead of using irsend send_once use a
send_start, sleep, send_stop. The exact amount of time for the sleep
may take some experimenting, but if i remember right for me it was
between 1 and 1.5 seconds. Too short and it won't consistently
register, too long and you will get some numbers being sent twice.

2. Always send an OK key press before changing channels. The STB will
go into standby after a period of no activity and this should wake it
up.

3. I had to have the STB in a cupboard with the doors closed (probably
due to florescence lights) for channel changes to work correctly.

With these settings things seemed to work reasonably well. I only had
it hooked up to mythtv for a short period of time so I am not
completely sure how reliable it would have been over the long run. In
the end we ended up dropping U-verse for non-MythTV reasons. On the
plus side, i don't believe they require a contract (at least with me
they didn't) so if it doesn't end up working out you can drop them and
try something else.


More information about the mythtv-users mailing list